| a. |
When did your firm implement its APS Advance
Practice Management system |
In June 2001 |
| b. |
How many users do you have? |
115 (initially 150) |
| c. |
Which APS products have you taken out licences to use? |
Practice Management, Xcede Professional Accounting
and Practice IQ… and we are looking at Tax 2004 |
| d. |
Who was you previous supplier and how long were you
using that supplier’s software for? |
Sol6 – we were with them for several years. |
| e. |
From start to finish, how long did the meeting, testing
and decision-making process take that saw you move over
to APS? |
The whole process took approximately 7 to 8 months. |
| f. |
Was your decision to move over to APS made on gut-feel,
or was it more scientific than that? Please explain how
you went about making your decision…. (e.g. team
approach: IT manager, IT Partner, Work Group etc…) |
It was more scientific – we had a project team
and project outline which looked at ‘does it do
this does it do that’; we needed to ensure the
product was future proof for the practice.
We also undertook lots of investigative work into APS itself to ensure
that it would be around in 10 years time, as this was critical to our Partners. |
| g. |
How long did you pilot and test the Advance product
set for functionality – and how many people were
involved? Was the APS team accommodating in this process
or did your APS contacts press you to make an early decision? |
We looked at several products over a 7 month period
- CMS Open, Xlon (pre-Sol6), Regional Practice (Sol6,
now defunct), MYOB could not really offer anything at
the time.
The APS team didn’t push for an early decision – but were very
accommodating. |
| h. |
Did testing the Advance product set provide any positive
surprises in terms of embedded functionality that you
did not know about….. functionality that could
help your business in a way that a PM system had not
previously? |
There were no real surprises at the outset. However,
we found that Advance could do lots of things we weren’t
expecting once it had been installed – things we
weren’t really aware of in testing and training. |
| i. |
APS prides itself on its ability to listen to its customers
regarding their business needs and business aims and
its commitment to then work closely with customers to
meet and achieve them. Tell us about the APS approach
from your perspective… |
It has worked out that way – the team is very
approachable. They like to assist in every way but don’t
always have the manpower….. so they have done extremely
well with number of people they have. That said, we have
had better service than we ever had with Sol6 over 13
years. |
| j. |
Did you feel that APS was ahead of its competitors
in terms of its functionality and how did you verify
the fact? (e.g. pilot / product testing methodology) |
Definitely – there wasn’t and still isn’t
anything else on the market like APS Advance. |
| k. |
Now that you have been using APS products for over
2 years, has the product and service met your expectations?
Please tell me about it……. |
It wasn’t the smoothest start due to the fact
we were the largest site to switch to APS at the time
(2001) - but 90% of our expectations were met. For instance
our early training was not the best and some of the features
demonstrated that the partners were expecting were not
there on day one…. but most were added on in due
course while some are still under development. Also,
Outlook integration was missing to start with although
it was expected to be included. But this year, Practice
IQ v3 has been a big step forward. |
| a. |
Functionality
Testing |
|
| i. |
Looking at APS from a product perspective,
what were the most important factors from a functionality
point-of-view that were seen as critical to your business – the
things that APS had to have if it was to be considered
as a your practice management and tax preparation software
provider? |
APS’ industry standard database was
the key item for us… being able to get the data
out of it really mattered to us because we couldn’t
do this with our previous provider… But APS’s
SQL database had this covered.
Secondly, APS’ windows-based product was a big leap forward over
our previous provider.
The third factor was Advance’s Reporting abilities. |
| ii. |
For your firm, what were the 3 critical things that
the APS Advance product and service offers over the competition
that helped finalise the decision to go with APS in place
of your incumbent supplier? |
1. its open database,
2. its future direction
3. ease-of-data manipulation in the way we wanted to view it |
| b. |
Ease-of-use
testing |
|
|
|
From a functionality point of view you have told us
why you moved to APS. Ease-of-use is also important:
how did you make sure that Advance is easy-to-use from
a practitioners’ perspective? |
Certainly, it was much easier to use than our previous
central database…. We were stunned by it!
|
| c. |
Future Development |
|
| |
What would you like to see APS add to its product set
in its next releases of Advance that will assist your
business? What does it need to do to stay ahead of its
competitors? |
We would like to see APS keep up with the enhancements
that Grant Thornton requests from time to time – as
well as with the changing needs of practices.
Sometimes, it’s the little things that can make all the difference.
For example, APS has a website where requests can be lodged and those requests
slowly turn into upgraded functionality. We would like to see quicker turnaround
on enhancements and more feedback regarding the status of the requested
enhancements.
The Development of Tax seems to be taking up lots of APS time which seems
to be forthcoming but slow. We would recommend APS sets up an enhancements
/ project team separate from the support team. |
| Were the following factors important to
you in determining if APS was the right provider for
your firm to go with:- |
| a. |
The fact that APS is a profitable business?
APS prides itself on the fact that it has posted a profit
every year since inception in 1991 |
Yes it is. The Stockford (APS’s one-time
owner) situation was a worry to the Partners but that
is all in the past now thankfully. |
| b. |
The fact that the Advance product set traces its lineage
and development path directly to its first release in
1994 ….. there has been no deviation from the product
roadmap – merely incremental annual upgrades to
the product. This has meant that customers have not had
to waste time and money implementing new systems on an
intermittent basis |
Yes this was a very important factor. It builds confidence
and trust in the product and the people. |
| c. |
What other corporate stability factors would you recommend
that firms should consider when choosing a Practice Management
system supplier? |
Firms should always look for a robust product… and
ease of upgrade and installation is important. APS has
to be installed on each machine.
Also, trainees must find the selected product it easy to use – and
we have found that our trainees can use APS. |
